Five years

I got a reminder via LinkedIn this morning that it’s now five years since I launched upon this madcap free-range experiment that I call Stamp. Coincidentally it would have been my grandmother’s 100th birthday yesterday, and 2013 would have been granddad’s centenary.

Living to 100 was something that very few of their generation could have hoped for. My kids have more than an evens chance to make it to three digits.

Whilst what I’m doing with stamp is far less unusual than it may have been in the past (working independently of traditional corporate employment, running multiple clients at any given time), as our lifetimes (and inevitably our working lives) extend it’s likely to become much more common.

It’s not a stress free existence. There’s never enough you can do, so turning off becomes a problem. Even more so if you are really enjoying it.

And the side projects (most recently wb40podcast.com and drawpod.wordpress.com) have become fulfilling learning exercises that both appear to be sprouting communities around them, which is making me realise that bringing people together is something I get a great kick from. I’m not sure it’s something that I could monetize, and I’m even less certain that it’s something that I would ever want to become purely commercial. But it’s certainly not what I envisaged five years ago when I had little more than a logo and a burning desire to get out of corporate employ.

Go with the flow. Leap and a net will appear. Here’s to the next five years.